Random Acts
by reallysmallworld
Summary: A short little one shot centering around the party where people are trying to pull mjolnir from the crater. What if someone worthy did manage it? What if the worthy one was the one least expected? What if they didn't even care?


The party thrives, despite the intense heat. The smell of grilled hamburgers and hot dogs fill the air along with the cheers, whoops, and hollers from the men surrounding the crater as one by one, they take turns pulling on what they call a satellite. None of them are able to wrench it free from the earth. Some attach it to long cables on the backs of their trucks, but each vehicle ends up being nearly torn in half. There are no sour moods, though, only laughter. This is a party, after all!

Pearl sits on the back of her father's truck with her younger brother, each of them with a cold coke in hand, watching the event at the edge of the crater. Pearl is thirteen years old, but she doesn't look it. She is a very scrawny, short creature with thin limbs that seem too long for her body and brilliant blue eyes that seem too large for her head, but she has a round, child-like face and curly, golden locks sprouting from the top of her head that are tied in braids to keep them off of her neck in the heat. In a word, she is cute.

Tyler, her brother, is also cute, but being only six, childishness is expected of him. He, too, possesses a similar round face and flowing blonde hair, but he has chocolate brown eyes and a fuller, healthier looking body. Like all younger brothers, he has a habit of annoying his older sister, but due in no small part to her talent for patience, they remain the best of friends. Today is one of their better days, and they sit back and relax together, enjoying the radio songs and the free food.

There is plenty of entertainment for them even after both of their parents try their luck at lifting the satellite (both fail, of course). The party-goers all line up to try their hand, each of them failing spectacularly at best. The siblings chuckle as people come away red-faced and shamed after their thirty seconds are up. (A time limit was added to keep the party going.) After a solid hour, Tyler turns to his mother, who has come back bringing yet another round of food, and says, "I want to try! I can lift it!"

Tyler is one of the best athletes in his grade and plays football, basketball, and baseball. Pearl smiles at him and pats his hair, which he prefers to keep long and is so much fun for her to mess with. "If anyone can do it, you can," she assures him.

"I'm sorry, honey," their mother croons, "but they made a rule that you have to be at least thirteen to try. They don't want anyone getting hurt." She, too, pets his head as his lip sticks out in a familiar pout. Pearl had perfected her cute face long ago, and her brother imitates it to a T. Of course, he then turns and uses it against her.

"Sister's thirteen," he points out, batting his unfairly long eyelashes at Pearl. She attempts to avoid his gaze, grumbling instead about him using her much-detested nickname, which was really him just being to lazy to use her real name. "Pwease?"

Pearl laughs and ruffles his hair, which he protests. "Alright, just stop it, okay? I'm going." She downs the last of her soda and hops out of the trunk with a small grunt. "I'll do it for you." Tyler cheers as she carefully makes her way down to the center of the crater, tripping over rocks on the way and deeply regretting wearing flip-flops.

The line is short, and before long, she is next. The man in front of her is massive, easily twice her size, but she watches as he is defeated by the satellite, as well; the earth seemed more likely to move than the satellite. A man has taken up the part of the announcer and dismisses the contestant once his time runs out, and he leaves, panting like a dog. It is now Pearl's turn, and the announcer does a double take before leaning in close to ask her what her age truly was. "Thirteen," she replies, flustered, though she really should be used to it. When you're as tiny as she is with an affinity for wearing all things pink and frilly, people make assumptions. The announcer gives her one last disbelieving stare before introducing her to the masses. There is mostly silence coupled with laughter from the crowd.

Pearl's cheeks burn, but not from the heat, as she nervously steps up to the satellite, feeling the mockery like daggers. A few things should be known about Pearl before the story continues, though. Despite their many similarities, Pearl is very different from her brother. Instead of athletics, she puts more stock into academics and is a straight-A student, but to keep herself active, she participates in recreation cheerleading, which is a sport thank-you-very-much! She is loved by teachers for being quiet in otherwise rowdy classes but is shy around her peers, not really afraid of speaking but afraid of being heard and being wrong. She returns all that she finds and is careful enough to watch over it for the owner and if possible, fix or clean it for them. To briefly sum up her personality, she is humble but caring and capable, and overall a good girl.

She finds her brother in the crowd, cheering her name and watching her with bright eyes. She would endure for him. The announcer asks if she is ready, and nodding, she turns back to the satellite. Up close, it doesn't look much like any satellite she has ever seen in pictures, though she knows that they have many strange shapes. This one looks very much like a hammer or a mallet, the kind she only sees in costume stores for Halloween. (She knows all about this, of course. Halloween is somewhat of a guilty pleasure for her, a chance to dress in all pink frills without getting too many strange looks.) The handle sticks out at an angle over a jutting out piece of rock, and it seems to her that if she presses down on the handle first, the mallet part will be lifted, like how a see-saw works. Then, she could lift the rest of it up with relative ease.

That's exactly what she does when the announcer starts the clock, and in a matter of three seconds, she has the satellite in her hands. She notices that it is rather heavy but not unbearably so. The announcer goes on, ignoring the murmurs of awe from the crowd and not turning around to face her. She grows uncomfortable under all of the stares. He reaches five seconds when Pearl speaks up. "May I put this down now?" she asks politely. The man whirls around, and his jaw drops to the ground. Pearl giggles at his comical expression before gently setting the satellite back in place. She skips back to her family and out of sight before anyone can figure out how to react.

The announcer goes over to the satellite himself as if to test for any fraud, but one solid tug on his part convinces him that there is no trick, no magnet, no last minute swap. He clears his throat and turns back to the crowd. "Well, let's give it up for Pearl!" The people roar for her, and she blushes furiously, not used to so much attention and approval. Addressing the next man in line, the announcer says, "Now, if you can't get it out after that little girl, we're going to have to send you over to Victoria's Secret." Everyone laughs but none as hard as Pearl. Surely, it had been no big deal.

Not long after, strange men in suits come and break up the party. Though her father can be a little hot-headed at times, Pearl's parents left without a fuss. The few people that are kept behind to be interviewed were still too stunned by Pearl's feat that they utterly forget to tell the men about it, and she had set it down before any reporters had seen, so there is no photographic evidence. Pearl is lucky and goes through her day with no further complications. On the car ride back into town, her brother hugs her suddenly, as if he had forgotten to earlier. "Thank you for doing that for me," he tells her in a honey-coated voice that leaves her suspecting that he was told to say that.

"You really stepped up to the plate there," her father praises.

She pets Tyler's head once again. "You're family. I'd do anything you ask," she says kindly. He smiles and releases her.

A few days later, though, as certain death is bearing down on the small town, no one asks her to help evacuate people from buildings. No one asks her to grab a panicking, lost child crying in the streets and carry it to safety. No one asks her to run through buildings to see if they are completely empty and that everyone is safe, but she does it anyway. She steps up to the plate, not for pride and glory, but because she cares.

**(Did an event like this happen to me in real life? Yes. Yes, it did. Believe me, it is the most awkward thing in the world walking into Hot Topic carrying a Cinderella blue pageant dress and heels to do a contest that grown men several feet taller than you are failing at just because your insanely adorable baby brother asked you to, and I did have it out by five seconds because of the whole see-saw thing. The Victoria's Secret line was actually said. Of course, I happened to not be very interested in super heroes at the time - curse you, me! - so after that good boost to my pride, it was pretty much forgotten about before the time I got home. I had a pageant to win, dang it! Today, however, I would probably be running around the house screaming in my brother's faces, "I AM WORTHY! I AM WORTHY TO HOLD MJOLNIR!" Anywho, I finally watched Thor the other day and decided to write a fic about the event. There you go!)**


End file.
